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I'm currently renting a 1940s house from my cousin for a good reasonable amount of money. But there is a problem. I have an aging Hot water furnace that sucks me dry. I have electric range and dryer. The only thing that the gas is connected to heat the water for the 3 sinks I have, 1 shower the washer and of course my furnace. I've been reading about bleeding the lines but I havn't done so yet.

What I've noticed is that my bill can be up to 200+, the house is one story and only 2 bedroom. I have the thermostate on an interial wall. That ususally reads 68-70, but then I placed another thermomater of the other side of the same room. That is reading 60-62, and no matter if i turn it up to 78 it will only raise to about 65.

Could you post back to advise of how many square feet you have in the house that have to be heated.

Has any service techs been over recently to try & get more heat out of the system, and what did they say?

Could you also post back to advise if the boiler is oil-fired, or gas-fired (is the boiler run by oil or gas).

Do you have a separate gas heater to heat the hot water for the sink and bath, or is this hot tap water obtained from the boiler?

Can you check the gauge on the boiler to tell us what is the psi reading (altitude) (should be 12-15 psi).

Also advise what the temperature needle on the gauge says (should be ~180 degrees when hot).

Can you hear any water gurgling in the pipes, and have you tried to bleed the system.

Do you have baseboard convectors, or cast iron radiators?

If you have baseboard, you can remove the side covers of the baseboard to try & see if there are any little bleed valves (air vents) on the ends of the fin tubes; they have a small screwdriver/coin slot; hold a small cup beside one & try to open it up.

If you have radiators, the bleed valve/air vent should be on the upper portion of the radiator, and are bled the same way.

A small screwdriver or a coin can be used to open the valve to expel the air; when water comes out, close the valve & go on to the next baseboard/radiator.

The site below has a photo of the bleed valve/air vent: at the top of the site, click onto "homeowner", then scroll down to the bottom of the page & click onto "valves"; scroll down & click onto "air vents, air valves", then click onto "No.4v Coin-operated air vent" to see what a bleed valve looks like; you will only be able to see the top half of the valve when you find it on your system.

Not about this mess, I kinda thought it was supposed to trickle But the weird temperature difference is what caught me. But the bleeding of the pipes would help out?

My cousin is in his late 50 to early 60s. He would have me do the work and not pay rent or few months or something like that. There was a sunroom that was added on to the house back in the 60's and there was no heating placed in that room. So i have a robe blocking the bottom side of the door, since it gets to be 38 degrees in there. I was kinda wondering if it would be wise to have that section open so that the forcful 38 degrees on the walks arn't conflicting with my 60-65 degress rooms?

Also I forgot that the serviceman did change something that looked like a cone canister with a handle and a little cylinder on one of the water pipes that goes to the water heater.